Showing posts with label strawberry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label strawberry. Show all posts

Sunday, October 23, 2011

First Strawberry Delight, Rocket & Spinach.

Hooray! I harvested my first ripe strawberry delight yesterday before going to church. Super sweet and juicy! Cant wait for more to come!
The free rocket seeds given by Bunnings have provided us with yummy salad greens for sandwiches.
Kao Kee Vegetables.  They are growing well and I harvested the tender shoots for stir-fry together with my spinach so that the plants can become bushier.
One of the many clusters of Carolina Black Rose grapes.  I gave the whole vine a good trimming so that the larger clusters can grow better :
The spinach this year is doing very well. Very big and leafy :
 Here's the basketful of spinach and the kao kee vegetables on the left :
We had the spinach stir-fried with garlic, shitake and golden mushrooms.  Hubby said 'Yummy!'.

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Updates After Our Trip

Our family just came back from a week of getaway - to Mt Buller for the snow and to Sydney + Nelson's Bay.  With a hobby such as gardening, I had to do all that I could to keep it going fine before I went away.  I was happy that not one plant died on me when I came back. The pak choys and gai choy/mustard green in this patch are growing well.

My propagated strawberry plants have done well too.  Before I left, I placed pot dishes under the pots and water them well. Whatever excess water was collected in the dishes and the plants get their water throughout the week from absorbing the water in the dishes.
This is galangal ginger which I bought last autumn from the Melbourne Flower Show. I have removed their plastic protection so they would not get frosts. They dont look too good now but I am quite confident they will take off soon.
I germinated some rocket seeds which were given by Bunnings when I went shopping.

My lemongrass with its plastic protection removed.  Surely looks better than without protection.
Found a herb growing in Figgy's pot.  I thought it was a coriander but it turned out to be parsley.

I realised I am not the only gardener who uses styrofoam boxes for gardening. I used this box to place the 'Kao Kee' vegetables which I am trying to propagate. After using the leaves for soup, I made a mix of propagating sand & compost, trimmed their stems, stuck them into the mix and watered them. I covered the box with plastic and stood the box in the shade while we were away.
Here's how the stems look like. Hopefully, they will root and give me Kao Kee vegetable for soup.  I have no idea what the English name for this veg is.  I only know the dialect name for it.  It is yummy when cooked with pork liver and wolfberries.
Just found out that one of the two original green globe artichoke plants is having a flower!!!

Four of my 12 sweet corn seeds have germinated. That was very long time but I guess we didnt have much warmth to germinate the seeds with the cranky unpredictable spring weather.

Friday, April 15, 2011

Choko, Coriander, Saffron Sativus, Chives, Thai Basil, Poppy, EChinaea (Cornflower) & Strawberry Delight

I planted some flower seeds last Friday outside the garage where there is a strip of soil. Cornflower (Echinaea), Poppy and Foxglove. It rained and rained almost the whole of this week. So far I have not seen the seeds germinated. I also planted some Mustard seeds (Biomulch) and Clover seeds in Patch F. The patch is empty now and the mustard and clover when grown, will be dug into the soil as nutrients for the soil.
My bittermelon plants are crawling up the trellis and have flowers but no fruit yet. I doubt I would ever get one this seaon since they only started growing December.
All 11 strawberry delight plants have done well and growing! They are all in styrofoam boxes which leak which is great because the boxes will not collect rainwater and drown the plants. Yeah more strawberries next season!!!
My thai basil are doing very well even with the cold rains. I hope I would be able to keep them alive through the coming cold winter months.
Chives (Asian type) have survived the dividing and re-planting. All I need is some support as the long leaves are falling all over the place.
The planter of saffron sativus crocus are growing. So far those 12 under my peach tree havent sprouted yet and I am beginning to wonder if I have planted them too dig. :(
Surprise find! Lots of coriander seeds have sprouted where the old coriander plants were. Very happy gardener here!
I decided to invest in a choko few days ago. I love to grow perenial fruiting plants, vegetables and flowers because I dont have to pay money to keep planting new plants. So I thought choko would be a good idea. It has gorgeous leaves, is perenial and bears fruits for dishes. This morning I found the base looking a bit different. Something is sprouting. I guess it could be the root. Many websites talk about choko planting but they never ever mention properly how to plant it. So I chose to place it in a bowl and see it sprout instead of planting it straight into the ground.

Saturday, March 12, 2011

It's Been A While.

It's been a long while since I last updated my blog. I have been rather ill-motivated recently due to some incidents regarding a neighbour who was renting the next house. It's nothing to do with gardening, just really affected by her character especially when we treated her like a sister. Anyway, she has moved out and our lives' sort of back to normal except some losses we have suffered. I had been doing a little here and there whenever necessary. I finally went back to my garden in full swing yesterday. I have been waiting for these two larger strawberries to ripen under the bare sunshine we were receiving lately. Finally my boy and I harvested them and each of us had one. So sweet having sun-ripened strawberries. The thought of it makes me drool!
I do have more strawberry flowers blooming. Such dainty flowers, so sweet and pretty as usual. One of the tasks for winter would be to divide all my strawberry clumps up. I have 8 pots to do and that's a big job! But if I dont divide the plants up, I wont get big berries next season.
My 5 Stringless Pioneer bean plants are fruiting, beaning?! These bean plants take up very little space. They dont need staking because they are dwarf and dont climb.
A plateful for lunch today.
I was extremely excited discovering a few of my fig (brown turkey) swollen and ripening two weeks ago. Since then my boy and I have eaten 3. This tree is in a large pot out of my dining window and it is in its 2nd summer. Last summer I had figs from this tree but they were dry and yukky. As this tree has a really tall and slender trunk, I chopped it down but it regrew in spring 2010. (See http://organic-is-better.blogspot.com/2010/09/fruit-trees-update.html )This summer, with ample watering, I have managed to eat some yummy, sweet and juicy figs. There is another fig (brown turkey) in my front garden, also confined to a pot, and is having figs that are also swelling. Can't wait to eat off that tree because this one was bought from Flemings Nursery!
There were some days when it was quite cold. My water spinach (kang kong) and Thai Basil suffered some 'burns' to their leaves and I had to resort to covering them with fleece. I expect to do a lot of frost protection this coming winter and have already starting work now in early autumn, driving stakes into the ground where frost-tender plants are.
This pest is the caterpillar of the grapevine moth. I have had quite a number eating the leaves of my Carolina Black Rose. Squashing them is the only way and I had to reach the leaves by climbing the ladder. The leaves are also having mild Downy Mildew which I need to treat with fungicide again.
The grapevine is doing very well growing everywhere on my back pergola roof. I had to add new strings across to support all the new growth. Soon the leaves will turn an autumny colour before shedding. Meanwhile I am enjoying this living green frame out of my kitchen window.

Friday, January 7, 2011

Our First Pixzee Peach for 2011 Plus Other Garden Updates.

Today's temperature is predicted to reach 35 deg celsius. Not a big deal as I believe this year's summer will be cooler and I doubt we are going to experience 46 again. Also, the garden is all mostly mulched up so the water retention will be good. Having said that, I spent one hour giving the whole garden water this morning. I have also put up some white cloths on three areas : over the burdock, over the hydrangeas and the ocra (ladies' fingers). I was trying to show my son my dwarf peach (pixzee) tree with its five large fruits. We could smell the fragrance without putting our noses near. One of them felt soft and when my boy reached out to touch it, it fell. We realised that this one was ready and shared it. Yummy, sweet and juicy!!!
This little pot of strawberry delight is producing quite a few strawberries. And the other plants are also having lots flowers.
I germinated some lemon balm recently. It is growing steadily but slowly.
Clockwise from top : bitter melon (bittergourd), evening primrose, watercress and eggplant. I know I am extremely late planting the bitter melon and eggplant. I sowed them with experimentation in mind but all of them germinated.
These are four pyrethrum daisies which I bought from Diggers. They grow so slowly and wilt so easily. I have repotted them into this pretty terracotta pot.
A Vietnamese kinder mum gave me these two Thai Basil plants which I repotted in this large pot. It's been difficult growing this basil probably due to the climate. It flowers too easily which is not good for herbs.
My two burdock plants in this vege patch are easily burnt by the hot sun due to their large leaves. I covered them with white cloth today.
More kang kong (water spinach) growing after the last harvest. This will be one vege I will keep planting every year. The seeds are of very superior quality.
My beloved yellow capsicum plant is in its 3rd year and fruiting!!! What an amazing plant!!!

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Update of All Sorts...

It has been another busy week. There were a few chores I had to finish for the garden - providing support for the climbing carolina black rose grape vine, weeding, netting the remaining unprovided peaches (from feathery looters), preparing ground for a new passion fruit vine, staking bean plants, pruning tomato plants, fertilising, decorating for Christmas....on and on...looks like it is not a few chores after all! Well we are still enjoying the brand new lawn and will continue to do so. Here I snapped Samuel and Marco having fun together. They were so cute!
The dietes. Arent they gorgeous? They are very common natives planted in multiple clumps for mass display. From far, they look like fluttering white butterflies because you can hardly see the green slender stems holding the flowers up.
Rather orchid-like.
I have successfully propagated a few aoeniums (wonder if the spelling is right or not) before pulling up the mother plant which look ugly. I have not decided what to do with the new plants yet.
The brown turkey fig tree right out of my dining window looks very healthy and it is having figs!!!
Here's the two pomegranate flowers. I am not diehard to eat any pomegranate from this tree which was left behind by the previous owner. It is a young handsome pomegranate tree. I just bought 3 large pomegranates for $5 and that's cheap! They are from USA. I realise these fruits are rather troublesome to eat though I heard they are very nutritious.
All my three sweet corns are flowering. Male or female I dont know. Having corns' more important haha...
My two-year-old gladioli are flowering again!!! So pretty while blooming but not so when they start to die down!
Yummy heart-shaped strawberry due to cojoining work!
And I love strawberry flowers! So delicate, so dainty, so sweet, so pretty!!!
Almost all my tomato silvery fir plants (7 in all) are flowering and fruiting. Yum Yum...
The kang kong's growing well in the new vege patch. So are the potato plants. And burdock too (hidden by potato).
Chilli fire plant fruiting crazily. I am going to harvest a big number of green chillies for pickles!
3 more beans yardlong have germinated at the site where the snow peas used to be.
I happen to take a picture of these two calendula seedlings exploding out of their seed hulls. Very nice.
"All that mankind needs for good health and healing is provided by God in nature...the challenge of Science is to find it." - Paracelcus, the father of Pharmcology, 1493 - 1541